Light On Dark Water

52 Poems, Week 7: Pattern (C.S. Lewis)

Some believe the slumber
Of trees is in December
     When timber’s naked under sky
And squirrel keeps his chamber.

But I believe their fibres
Awake to life and labour
     When turbulence comes roaring up
The land in loud October,

And plunders, strips, and sunders
And sends the leaves to wander
     And undisguises prickly shapes
Beneath the golden splendour.

Then form returns. In warmer,
Seductive day, disarming
     Its firmer will, the wood grew soft
And put forth dreams to murmur.

Into earnest winter
With spirit alert it enters;
     The hunter wind and the hound frost
Have quelled the green enchanter.

This was not the poem I had planned to write about first, or even at all, but a few days ago I exchanged a few comments with someone on Facebook about Lewis’s poems, and I remembered my favourite one, and thought, “I’ll write about this one first instead of the other.” Then on my way to the library to get the book, I remembered another one and thought that would be it; and then while thumbing through the book, I found this one which I have no recollection of ever reading before, but I must have, because I’ve read them all, I think.

The reason I chose "Pattern" is because it echoes so well what I feel about trees in winter. That is when I love them best. It isn’t when they look the loveliest, except perhaps when they are covered in snow, or turned to gold by the setting sun the way we were talking about earlier. They reveal those prickly shapes. You can see the real tree, and read its story in its broken branches and bent trunk.

That last line about the green enchanter reminds me of The Silver Chair and the Lady of the Green Kirtle, and her green smoke that masks the truth.

I’m pretty sure that this won’t be the last Lewis poem that I select.

—Janet Cupo is a great-grandmother (and a great grandmother) on temporary (maybe) sabbatical from the workaday world.

Maclin Horton

21 responses to “52 Poems, Week 7: Pattern (C.S. Lewis)”

  1. Mac

    Yeats has a short poem, sort of an epigram I guess, that’s somewhat related:
    http://www.bartleby.com/147/43.html

    Reply
  2. Stu

    Lovely poem, Janet.

    Reply
  3. Craig

    I think this is the first poem by C.S. Lewis that I’ve ever read.

    Reply
  4. Janet

    Well, you will probably read another one in a few weeks.
    AMDG

    Reply
  5. Paul

    Me too – a couple of years ago I was surprised to read that Lewis was a poet, and I never did get round to hunting any of them down.

    Reply
  6. Robert Gotcher

    In the 1920s his plan was to be a poet. Then he got religion.

    Reply
  7. Janet

    A poet was what Lewis wanted to be. He wrote a long narrative poem in his late 20s called Dymer. You can download it here
    He disliked the poetry of Eliot and his like and with some friends wrote parodies of modern poems and submitted them to The Criterion under the names of Rollo and Bridget Considine. Nothing ever came of it.
    AMDG

    Reply
  8. Janet

    Cross-posted. He continued to write and publish poetry into the 50s.
    AMDG

    Reply
  9. Mac

    The first few lines of the first poem in the collection of his poetry that I have are a dig at Eliot, which is a little off-putting to an Eliot fan. I’ve had the book since 1980 or so but I’m sure I’ve never read every poem in it. He’s not my favorite poet but there are several poems in this book that have stuck with me for many years. Including one rather grossly striking one involving rocket as penis.

    Reply
  10. Janet

    I must not have read them all.
    AMDG

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  11. Janet

    He did like Eliot himself and agreed with his ideas. He just didn’t like that style of poetry.
    AMDG

    Reply
  12. Mac

    As I recall, subject to correction after so many years, he was somewhat hostile to Eliot from a distance, as poet and maybe as critic. But I don’t think they’d met at the time. Later on they did and Lewis said to someone else “He’s one of us.”
    The poem is “Prelude to Space”. The collection I have is just called Poems, and it’s edited by Walter Hooper. I think it’s supposed to be all his shorter poems (i.e. not Dymer) but I’m not sure.

    Reply
  13. Janet

    Yes, I just found it. No, I have never read that before. There us a list of previously published poems in the back of the book and that one is not among them.
    Who knows where Hooper found some of these.
    AMDG

    Reply
  14. Mac

    Are you looking at the same book? Mine has that appendix, too. Hooper made the decision as to what to include and seems to have opted for pretty much everything. Seems at least possible that Lewis didn’t mean for it to be published.

    Reply
  15. Janet

    Yes, I am. This has to have been written pretty late in his life. The space race didn’t begin until the late 50s. Of course, it’s pretty much the same sentiment you see in the Space Trilogy.
    AMDG

    Reply
  16. Mac

    It could have been somewhat earlier, as the basic idea had been used in science fiction at least since the ’40s. But the poem does sort of sound like it’s describing something actually happening or about to happen.

    Reply
  17. Janet

    That’s what I was thinking.
    AMDG

    Reply
  18. Elaine

    Thank you! This is my favorite winter poem. I read it and savor it every year!

    Reply
  19. Mac

    I didn’t write the post but since it’s my blog will say “you’re welcome.”

    Reply
  20. Lyndsay

    Why is the version of ‘Some Believe’ in ‘The authentic voice’ by William Griffen’ different?

    Reply
  21. Mac

    Sorry, no idea.

    Reply

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